Summer Reading

Roomies by Sara Zarr and Tara Altebrando

Supplied by Bookbridgr.com

Seeing this book on the Bookbridgr review scheme made me very happy - two of my favourite teen fiction tropes and by an author I already love.  I was a very happy Norfolkbookworm to find this on my doorstep over the weekend.

Lauren and Elizabeth are about to leave home for the first time to go to university, they've been assigned as room-mates for their first year and so spend the summer emailing each other in preparation for the autumn.

The book isn't deep, and there was little in it that related to my memories of leaving home for uni but I loved the book, the way that the girls are slowly trying to sort their lives out before a big change and how two such very different people can be so similar in many ways was wonderfully conveyed.  The characters felt real and their situations always realistic which is an achievement when as an adult you read light fiction aimed at teenagers.

I think that the mixture of sensible length emails interspersed with straight forward narration worked well, too often when reading epistolary fiction I lose interest because in reality very few people would write letters/emails that long every time.

I needed the escapism of something easier to read after a session of longer, complicated books and a big event at work - this fitted the bill completely and was a fun read.  I hope that we hear more from LoCo and EB as they were such strong voices.